How to groom a beard yourself
How to Shape Up Your Beard (4 Step Tutorial) | GQ
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here's the best way to create a curved
line we're going to use our trimmer
inverted to punch a line in
and i'm going to stretch the skin up
higher like this
so you can see once we release that it
has a slightly soft bend
and that beard looks a lot better
groomed hey gq
as promised i'm back and i can't wait to
clean this up
okay let's recap about a month ago i
shaved off a beard that i've had for
almost
10 years if you haven't seen that video
go check it out so you probably noticed
a few changes from the last video
because
after you cut off a great big beard your
face shape changes substantially
what we're going to do now is we're
going to grow our beard back and i've
been doing this just
without touching it at all i haven't
shaved i haven't shaped i haven't done
anything i've just let it grow for four
weeks now normally i wouldn't recommend
people doing that
sometime around the two-week mark is
probably when you want to start creating
a little bit of a shape
but i wanted to leave it so i could show
you guys the dramatic impact that it
makes
some of the things you're going to
experience in the first four weeks
itchiness
disheveledness you're probably going to
want to try to use beard oil
don't you're probably going to outline
it too quick
[Music]
and you're probably going to start
taking clippers and guards to it don't
do any of those things
just wait and if you've avoided the
temptation to do any of those things
you're probably in good shape for a
shape up for this what we're gonna need
is a trimmer now remember a trimmer
is about creating edges so it's very
fine teeth and gets all the way down to
the skin
an electric shaver or a razor blade of
your choice
i like electric shavers because i don't
get so many ingrowns on my neck
you are also going to want to have some
sort of a soft brush and a finishing
balm
in one of my previous videos i was
showing you guys how to trim up a long
beard
now a lot of the concepts are going to
be very similar but with a long beard we
started
by trimming down the interior at this
length i don't want to remove anything
so we're going to skip to step two which
is the outline
[Music]
the outline is just three lines it's the
top line
the baseline and the lip line so let's
start with the baseline because it's
going to have the highest amount of
impact
the baseline of the beard is the line at
the bottom
that kind of echoes the shape of your
jaw one of the things that happens when
we first start growing our beards is
that this area keeps growing and gets
really really thick
and if you notice when i drop my jaw
down here you can still see
all of the hair in behind seeing the
hair in behind is kind of a problem
because it softens the look of your jaw
and we want that jaw to look strong so
what we're going to do is we're going to
bring this line up
and we're going to make it really nice
and clean so that when you put your
neckline down it amplifies the shape of
the jaw and gives it a stronger
lineation
we're going to start from the corner of
the jaw and we're going to make a
straight line down to the top of the
atom's apple
just like this
you can see we've got that nice strong
line down now we want to make sure we
don't take that line up too high to the
corner this little corner of the jawline
because what happens is
when you turn your head that line lifts
up and it sneaks up over top of your jaw
and that's what we call a chin strap
it's not that flattering now this hair
down here has a tendency to grow
upwards to make sure that we don't just
scrape this off using our trimmer
i'm going to turn it to the softer
position here and i'm going to work
upwards into the line we created
to remove all that nasty neck fluff
i'm just going to take my soft brush and
i'm going to remove
any shrapnel making sure i get
everything that's attached
and right back here especially
all right now you can already see a
difference from side to side
now let's get the other side to make
sure we get that nice and even so i'm
going to tilt my chin back
go from the corner of my jaw
now you'll notice on that side i started
a little lower and work my way higher
and the reason why i do that is because
i want to make sure it's balanced on
both
sides so on the second side i usually
start a little lower i check to make
sure it's balanced
and then i move it up as i need to
[Music]
now the easiest way to make sure the
line is straight and clean is just tilt
your neck back
and have a look see if there's anything
sticking out
or any little bunk
now that line should descend slightly so
it's going to start up high and drop to
a little bit lower just like your jaw
does
what our goal for this line is as we
grow our beard out is to be able to
bring this
lower and lower and lower to match the
front
length of our beard the big key here is
that you don't want to see
any hair growing on the neck behind the
jawline because once we remove that
it creates a stronger more amplified jaw
the next line we need to work on
is our top line a lot of guys don't pay
attention to this but the top line
is how we're going to edge out where the
beard interacts with the face
you have two options for this line you
can either make something that is really
straight and linear
or you can make something that is
slightly curved and that really depends
on your face shape when you have a
narrow face
shape you want to work with something
that is a little bit more of a curved
line
if you have a fuller face shape you want
to try and keep that square
because it gives a slightly leaner
appearance i think i'm going to go with
the curved line
here's the best way to create a curved
line we're going to use our trimmer
inverted to punch a line in
and i'm going to stretch the skin up
higher like this
by stretching that skin and putting a
straight line in
when i relax that skin it's going to
have a slight bend to it
so you can see once we release that it
has a slightly soft bend
and that beard looks a lot better
groomed
now i'm going to remove the hair on top
of my cheeks with my trimmer
and i'm going to repeat this on the
opposite side
that's looking a lot better already now
what we need to do is keep these pesky
little hairs out of my mouth
they're really short and this is maybe
something that you won't need to do for
the first
even six to eight weeks but eventually
that mustache
is gonna start to overtake those lips
for this part i usually like to just
take my trimmer
and just clean my lip line to make sure
that when i'm drinking coffee out of a
mug
it doesn't go all down my white t-shirts
now the trick to this line is that it's
slightly peeked in the center
you don't want to just come in and
hammer a straight line across
what you want to do is you want to angle
from the center down towards the corner
of your mouth
and again from this side down towards
the corner of your mouth you can do that
by taking your trimmer and
angling it before you press in to remove
those hairs
now we don't need to do much to the
interior at this point and you can see
that as far as beards go it's looking a
whole lot better we're just going to go
over our neck and cheeks
using the shaver or using whatever razor
that you want to use to remove the hairs
this is just
one more element of making it look extra
clean and polished
and this is a really good way for you to
be able to do the maintenance that this
is going to require for the next few
weeks
you really want to just keep this area
clean and free from hairs
so i'm going to take my shaver and i'm
just going to go over that and clean it
up
and voila you've crafted for yourself a
fine looking beard
now if you really want to crisp this up
or you want to take this a little
sharper
use things like powders or color go
visit your barber
he's going to have great advice on how
you're going to be able to make this
look sharp
on the long term
the last thing you want to do once
you've shaved things down to the wood
especially if you've shaved with a
straight razor
or any kind of a safety razor is you
want to make sure your skin cares on
point for the next little while you want
to make sure that you're using a good
moisturizing wash
and for those of you that shave and
outline your beard every day
i really suggest using some sort of an
aftershave balm
i don't love the idea of using liquid
aftershaves when you have facial hair
because it tends to dry them out
and it actually makes things itchier but
what i like to do is i like to use some
sort of a cream aftershave
or a cream balm which is more
moisturizing and is better because it
actually moisturizes the beard
also at this point i would really
suggest staying away from beard oil
beard oil is meant for longer fuller
beards it's really about
conditioning the hair with a little bit
of moisture for the skin as well
the more oil you add to it at this point
the more you're going to increase the
likelihood of having oily skin or
breakouts
so try and stay away from that i suggest
using some sort of a beard balm
just to get rid of those little flyaway
guys or the ones that are starting to
stick out
so take a little bit of that just to
finish try and stay away from oil-based
ones i like things that are a little bit
more of a wax and a matte finish because
i don't like it when my beard looks
shiny
and i'm just going gonna work that on
just to take away any of the little
flyaways or the guys that are sticking
out
and not looking too clean if you're
watching along and you're still not
convinced
and you don't see the value in growing a
beard let me be the first to tell you
a beard can change your life
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